Tag: poppies

Maria Calandra at Fredericks & Freiser Gallery

Red-orange skies appear to be ablaze in Maria Calandra’s landscape painting of Weir Island in Maine while her blue skies over Como, Italy are a tranquil color but feature roiling clouds.  Apocalyptic in their color and Mannerist in their elongated forms, Calandra’s paintings at Fredericks & Freiser Gallery are hallucinogenic visions that offer visual pleasure via their dynamic fluidity.  Here, Mont Sainte-Victoire, made famous by Paul Cezanne’s many images of the mountain near Aix-en-Provence, rises above a field of flowers and greenery that appears to be flowing up the mountain.  (On view in Chelsea through April 13th.)

Maria Calandra, Mont Sainte-Victoire, acrylic on linen, 2023.

Daniel Gordon in ‘Rose is a Rose is a Rose is a Rose’ at Jack Hanley Gallery

Taking flowers or nature as the theme for a summer group exhibition isn’t particularly original or necessarily avant-garde.  Still, nature’s beauty and uplift as symbol of regeneration is irresistible to audiences and to the curators of ‘A Rose is a Rose is a Rose’ at Jack Hanley Gallery, who apologetically admit that painting flowers is ‘embarrassing.’  This paper sculpture by Daniel Gordon, which recalls still lives throughout art history (think Cezanne and Matisse) and pushes the possibilities of photography as sculpture, suggests that the show’s organizers have nothing to worry about.  (On view on the Lower East Side through August 3rd).

Daniel Gordon, Poppies, Pitcher & Fruits, pigment prints, glue and wire, 41 x 51 x 18 inches, 2018.